


wander unknown worlds

by amberbee112



Category: White Noise (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Family, Forests, Gen, Magic, liminal spaces
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-02
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-03 00:09:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16797511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amberbee112/pseuds/amberbee112
Summary: Liya gets lost in the forest. Like any brother, Hawk follows. They both end up very, very lost. But they both make some friends. They'll be fine, probably.Inspired by those stories of people just disappering, Over The Garden Wall, and General Forest Aesthetic.





	1. the sight held me fixed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Liya is lost. 
> 
> Then she is less lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> down they fell like the children of eden  
> down they fell like the tower
> 
> (pale white horse - the oh hellos)

Liya frowned.

It was a tree stump. She was in the forest, she'd seen dozens of tree stumps. There was nothing particularly special about this particular tree stump, no poisonous mushrooms, no snails, no animal nest lurking inside.

But it seemed _familiar_.

Liya glanced down at the muddy path beneath her feet, and toed at the ground for a moment. She picked up a round white rock and set it on top of the tree stump. Then she continued on her path.

The forest felt so alive, all different shades of green and the only sounds winds rustling the leaves and birds singing. It felt like she was miles and miles away from civilization, which, it occurred to her, she might actually be. Last night Em, Hawk, and herself had just been on the edge, close to the highway, but then--

Liya stopped herself. She didn't need to worry about them. They would be fine, they would be at the campsite, and what was the worst that could happen to them there? A raccoon stealing some garbage? Really, she should just stop right now, stop trying to get back to them and sit and wait for them to come find her. That's what you were supposed to do.

But she had done that all night, sitting against a tree half asleep, too cold and too anxious to fall asleep, occasionally calling out to a brothers with a “I’m here!” or “Where are you!”. She knew which way she came from, she ran for all of five minutes, she couldn't have gotten _that_ lost, and the forest... 

Liya blinked. It was that same stump. The white stone she had just placed sitting in the middle. She thought she was being paranoid. Had she really been going in circles for who knows how long?

Liya glanced suspiciously up and down the path. She couldn't have been going in a circle, the path didn't curve. A straight line as far as she could see. The path had to lead somewhere, it was _muddy_ , there was no grass growing on it. That meant it was _used_. That meant there was a _destination_. And anyway, hadn’t she’d seen a fork in the road a while ago?

Liya turned on her heel and went back the way she came.

It felt like a longer time before she reached the tree stump this time, but maybe it was because she wasn't as lost in her thoughts as she was before. She kept a vigilant eye for the fork she came from, a building through the trees, a curve in the otherwise straight path, the dang tree stump again, _anything_.

And then there it was. 

Liya scowled at the tree stump. Then she sat on the tree stump. It wasn’t a very good chair. It was half decomposed and crumbled under her weight. But Liya was tired of walking and going nowhere, so she sat and thought.

Most of the thoughts she was thinking were about how stupid she was for getting lost in the first place. For running off. For getting stuck in a weird circular path that didn’t go anywhere. Well, not really stuck, she could go off the path and get even more lost. 

Or get off the path and find her way back home. She hadn’t been following a path when she first entered the forest.

The thought whispered in the back of her brain, urging her on against her better judgment. That she could get home herself. It was why she was this lost in the first place.

You were supposed to stay put when you were lost.

But a part of her knew it was too late for her.

_What’s the worst that could happen?_

Liya stood up and stepped off the path. She took a few steps into the woods and glanced behind her. The stump still sat innocently there. Liya went further, grass and plants up past her ankles, and the stump, less visible through the trees, stayed where it was. Whatever made her go in circles must have been the path, not the stump, Liya decided. That particular tree stump was just the most convient, noticible landmark on the path. She was no longer on the path, so she wasn't going in circles anymore.

Liya trekked on. The ground seemed to dip and rise around here a lot more, scraggly bushes growing between rocks obscuring most of the hazards. The trees had spread out, yet the canopy above still obscured the sky. Birds were chirping somewhere, but she couldn’t see any. Liya thought she saw a fox. But, just like all wildlife in the forest, it seemed to disappear before her eyes could focus on it. 

Liya exhaled. The air was fresh and calm, and she found herself enjoying it.

The ground began to slope steeply downwards. One false step had Liya first stumble, then get her foot caught, and then finally fall down the rocky hill.

When she rolled to a stop, Liya did not move. She let out a long groan and considered dying right there. Right there, among the moss and the bugs. Perfect. Comfy.

She laid still long enough that eventually, the sun fell on her eyes. She sighed. She sat up, rubbed her eyes. 

A cabin, a hundred yards away.

Liya stared at it for a few long moments. She hadn’t realized how lost she felt until she saw a log cabin, complete with lights in the windows. A sign of civilization. Not too far away.

What an amazing coincidence.

Liya moved to stand up, and hissed with the sudden rush of pain in her leg. The cabin was maybe a little far away to walk with a sprained ankle. Fuck. 

Liya exhaled. It could be worse. She was within sight of help. She just had to yell loud enough, or wait for someone to come outside, or crawl all the way to the cabin. She was fine. She wasn’t panicking.

“H-Hey!” Liya shouted in the general direction of the cabin. “I need help!”

Her words seemed to be swallowed up by the trees, or maybe her words just kept going on and on, and never bounced back to her. Unnerving.

Liya watched the cabin for a few more long moments, seeing no movement. She called again, grumbled, and started crawling towards the cabin. Easier said than done, with all the rocks.

A figure exited the cabin, and Liya paused mid-crawl. “Hey! Can you help me?”

The figure turned to look at her. She could tell they were tall and thin, with a pale face. They started moving closer.

The closer they got, the less certain Liya was that she _wanted_ their help. Their limbs, a woody umber, were too long and thin to contain muscle and bone. Their neck was almost spinelike, and atop that was the pale face, almost completely flat except for their eyes, nose and mouth. It was more like a mask than anything else.

The willowy being bent down nearly double when they reached her, their white mask-face showing concern. “Are you alright?”

“Hi,” Liya said in a very small voice. “I’m Liya. I’m-I’m hurt.”

The being’s mask like face formed a small smile. “Hello Liya, you can call me Helygen.”


	2. waiting on a moment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now Hawk's the one who's lost. But he's not the one who's injured.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Three four five, all the steps lead right  
> Down down down the rabbit hole  
>   
> (emily - san fermin)

Liya seemed to have vanished.

He had followed her, she wasn't that much faster than him, but the undergrowth slowed the both of them down, but maybe it slowed Hawk down more, but…

“Liya!” Hawk called, voice echoing through the trees.

But it didn't make sense, any of it. Why she thought it was a good idea to run so far into the forest in the first place. Why he couldn’t hear the rumble of cars in the distance. Their shitty campground was pretty close to the highway.

It was like Hawk was teleported miles and miles away from civilization.

Hawk exhaled. Maybe continuing in the direction he _thought_ he came from wasn’t the best idea. But if he stopped now he would think too much about he was alone, and how Liya was probably alone, and that wasn’t a path he was ready to go down yet. He kept walking.

He kept walking for who knows how long. It felt long but the sun hardly moved in the trees above him.

Something was following him.

The hairs on the back of Hawk’s neck had been prickling for a while, yet each time he glanced behind him all he could see was the vast green expanse of the undergrowth.

He kept walking.

Leaves rustled, just behind him. Hawk turned around immediately, but nothing was _there_ except a bush and the feeling of eyes burning into the back of his neck.

Hawk stared at the bush for a moment, then continued on. If he was being followed by something, so be it. Obviously no matter what he did he wasn’t going to _see_ it, so why

Something heavy hit the ground behind him. A branch broke.

A little part of his brain told him he shouldn’t look behind him. That he shouldn’t be there. So he did the only reasonable thing to do in this situation.

He ran like hell.

Hawk wasn’t conscious of what direction he was running. He didn’t know what he was running from, only aware of a primal feeling in his stomach telling him that danger was nearby.

Eventually the hairs on the back of his neck lowered, and Hawk slowed down. He’d ran a good distance, and effectively wiped any bearings he had in this hell of a forest.And he was still alone.

Alone and exceptionally lost by now, he noted. If he wasn’t super lost before, he definitely was now. Going in no direction in particular would do that to you. It's what Liya did, and now they were both lost.

She was following something, he amended his thoughts. It wasn’t random, he’d seen the light and heard the voice too, she’d just beat him to the bad decision.

That wasn’t really comforting.

Hawk sighed. He really hoped Em had enough sense to not follow and get absurdly lost too. 

Now what. You were supposed to find water, right?

Hawk changed his course a little so he was heading more downhill. 

He stepped over a half rotten log with mushrooms on it. Mushrooms liked moisture, right? Maybe that was a good sign, that he was actually approaching a source of water.

Hawk paused suddenly, squinting through the trees. 

The forest was weirdly quiet, no birds, no wind, but the distant sound of water running.

He grinned. That was a sure sign he was going the right way.

  
  


It took him far too long to find the river. It seemed to get quieter and louder as he approached. One minute he was sure he could see it through the trees, the next the sound would be as faint as when he first heard it.

That probably wasn’t a good sign. Maybe he was hallucinating it.

But, nevertheless, he found it.

Hawk stood over the river, a good fifteen feet wide, and wracked his brain. He’d seen maps of the area before. A river this size would be on one, right?

Hawk sighed and knelt down by the water. The idea that he had somehow wandered a hundred miles in what, a day? Less? Was concerning, to say the least. He cupped his hands and took a sip of the water. 

Hawk sighed. This wasn't the forest he entered. Or, he entered a forest that wasn’t the forest that was usually there? The point was, he had no fucking clue where he was. Maybe it was useless waiting for help, then. Following a river would maybe lead him to civilization. But which way, upstream or downstream? Just looking, there was no obvious sign which way to go. Hawk sighed. Was Liya in this weird forest too? A duck quacked.

Hawk looked wearily at the duck. “What do you think? What do I do now?”

It quacked, in an almost comforting way.

“It’s prolly useless trying to find Liya now. Don’t even know which way to start looking.”

Another quack. Short, kinda sounded like “Yeah” 

“Feels wrong to just...abandon her though.” Hawk sighed. “Suppose I should worry about myself though.”

The duck quacked again.

“Are you having a conversation with a _duck_?” An amused voice behind him asked.

Hawk jumped to his feet, turning back and ending up face to face with a freckled man quite a bit shorter than him. “...Maybe.”

“Don’t think there's a maybe about it.” He smiled. “Sorry for scaring you.”

Hawk looked away from his eyes, and noted that one of his arms was in a sling. “It’s fine. Are you okay?”

He sighed. “I’m not bleeding out,” He surmised. “I’m Teige Carroll.”

“I’m Hawk.”

“So Hawk,” Teige promptly sat down in the rock Hawk was just sitting on. “I might have overheard you talking to that duck about finding someone.”

Hawk self consciously crossed his arms. “Uh, yeah. Can you help…?”

“She’s probably in Qydhi, closest thing to a city in the Forest. Most lost people end up there sooner or later.” Teige said.

“You know how to get there?”

“Nope, but you’re lost right? You’ll get there eventually.”

Hawk took a moment to process this. “I dont think thats how getting lost works.”

Teige snorted. “I can tell you aren't from The Forest.”

“No?” Hawk said tentatively. “Are...you?”

“I’ve lived here my whole life, pretty sure that counts.” 

“That’s cool. Thanks, I guess.” Hawk glanced upwards at the sun. Still plenty of daylight left. He should probably follow the river, but upstream or downstream? If what Teige said was true, it didn't matter. But on the other hand, if it wasn't, he sure would like to maximize the chance of running into civilization. Downstream sounded right. 

Teige stood up and shoved his free hand in his pocket. “Mind if I come with you?”

“What?” Hawk might have been a little lost in thought.

“Might as well go together, makes more sense, and to be honest I’d rather not be alone.”

“That’s fair enough. You going to the city to get someone to fix up that arm?”

Teige paused. “Not in the way you would think,” He answered slowly.

“How so?” Hawk cocked an eyebrow.

“See, I know someone who could’ve fixed it up fine, but the thing is, I’m cursed.”

“You’re cursed.” Hawk repeated, chuckling internally. His life got so fucking weird, so fast. “What, by like an evil witch?”

“Yup, asshole,” Teige said under his breath. “So magic won’t quite stick to me. And there ain’t much for me to do until it heals, so I figured to hell with it, might as well just get rid of it.”

“Might as well,” Hawk shrugged, unable to hold back a smile. “Why not get your curse removed. What else are you gonna do with a curse.”

“Hey,” Teige said crossly, but he was smiling too. “Let’s get going, I wanna get to Qydhi before it freezes.”

“Sounds good,” Hawk replied, and the two started walking along the river.


End file.
